A young eighteen year old girl becomes Paprika, a prostitute, in order to raise money for her boyfriend. Paprika, played by the beautiful Deborah Caprioglio is the creation of the auteur of sexy Mr Tinto Brass who delights in displaying his lead in various states of undress and from all angles.

Unlike the surreal Belle de Jour this film does not deal with foibles of the bored but, despite the fact that Paprika clearly learns to enjoy her work, it is a largely economic calculation. Paprika is in this for the money.

Being a Tinto Brass movie it is pretty sexy and incredibly well shot but the lighthearted and frivolous aspects of the film do not mean that the oldest profession is romanticised without criticism as issues such as pregnancy, abortion, violence by pimps and the occasional john and venereal diseases are all explored. The sex is treated matter of factly, as to be expected, though at it's heart this postwar brothel flick is a fluffy and light cinematic soufflé.

In his final feature film British actor John Steiner, more commonly a typecast villain, is completely barmy as an off his head cocaine snorting aristocrat and there is the briefest of blink and you will miss it appearences by Eugénie de Sade star Paul Muller.

Nigel MaskellEditor
Nigel is the founder of Italian Film Review and an avid collector of Italian crime and giallo film. He occasionally writes reviews at Pickled Cinema. Ennio Morricone, The Lickerish Quartet and Lucio Fulci rock his world.Read Reviews

Jenny SpencerEditor
Jenny was introduced to Italian horror by watching Demons as a child, but became hooked after Suspiria. She loves zombies, slashers, gialli, Dario Argento, any film with Edwige Fenech, and the soundtracks of Goblin and Fabio Frizzi. Read Reviews

Brian BankstonReviewer
Brian grew up watching all manner of genre cinema either at the drive in, or on late night television before the video age turned him on to a whole other world of exploitation exploration. He is the owner and author of coolasscinema.com. Read Reviews

George PachecoReviewer
George Pacheco is a diehard Italo-Phile whose obsession with horror, giallo and Poliziotteschi borders upon the unhealthy. When not writing for Rue Morgue, Examiner.com and the Italian Film Review, George spends his time obsessing over Maurizio Merli's impeccable mustache and indulging a shameful Franco Nero fetish.Read Reviews

Jason MeredithReviewer
Jason fell in love with Italian genre movies after watching Dario Argento’s Inferno on video in the early eighties. Uses references to alternative cinema in his everyday work as a storyteller and producer of TV shows in Sweden. Also runs the CiNEZiLLA blog and named one of his kids after a Russian satellite.Read Reviews

John Plumley Reviewer
Film fan with a deep appreciation for Italian horror and gialli, writing under the nom de plume Giovanni Susina on his blog At The Mansion Of Madness. His love for Italian horror was sealed after watching a screening of Lucio Fulci's The Beyond. Read Reviews

Jonny RedmanReviewer
Jonny is the founder of the lovelockandload Eurocult movie forums. Has been into the more 'alternative' side of cinema since watching the horror double bills on the BBC as a 10 year old back in the '70's and found his love for European 'cult' cinema with the video boom in the early '80's Read Reviews

Justin HarriesReviewer
Justin runs and co-curates Filmbar70, a London based film club committed to screening ‘not your average cult’ movie. A dedicated Fenechphile, Justin loves the sexy side of Italian cinema, enduring even the most puerile of sex comedies for a glimmer of glam. You can see his motion tributes here, and find out about the latest Filmbar70 screening here. Read Reviews

Keith BrownReviewer
Keith is a PhD student and self-employed computer guy who likes films, especially those that are a bit off the beaten track. He is author of the influential Giallo Fever blog. Read Reviews

Mario GauciReviewer
Mario has been a film enthusiast for as long as he can remember. Watching movies or reading about them soon wasn't enough and some 10 years ago he started writing about them and writing them as well. Whether he will ever actually make them, remains to be seen... Read Reviews

Mike CommaneReviewer
An ardent, low-rent genre film enthusiast since childhood, Mike co-founded VTSS in 2010 with Nadeem Ali. Currently attempting to watch and review the entire work of John Saxon, he spends his spare time hunting down episodes of Falcon's Crest and Murder She Wrote...Read Reviews

Mike MalloyReviewer
Mike is a filmmaker, actor, writer and the man behind the documentary Eurocrime! The Italian Cop and Gangster Films that Ruled the '70s. Read Reviews

Paige SandsReviewer
Paige is a cinema buff, collector and artist from New Zealand. Her love for Italian cinema began with classics such as Demons, Phenomena, Opera and Suspiria. Read Reviews

Rich FlannaganReviewer
Rich is old enough to remember scouting around second hand shops for the original video nasties. He is currently buying on blu-ray all the films he already has on DVD or video. Rich writes the 0.50 Action Express blog. Read Reviews

Rob TalbotReviewer
Growing up on Hammer and Universal Rob turned to the 'nasties' and European genre film as a teenager through 3rd generation tapes, preferring these to disposable Hollywood hamburger cinema. Rob also writes for horror magazines Scream and Diabolique, and updates Mondo Euro whenever he can.Read Reviews

Russell WitheymanReviewer
Russell's passion for Italian films started in the 80's watching Lucio Fulci's Zombi 2 for the first time. He is especialy into Italian horrors and Poliziotteschi films and also enjoys all forms of exploitation cinema from Corman stuff to Blaxploiation and anything weird and wonderful! Read Reviews

Shaun AndersonReviewer
Shaun is the author of The Celluloid Highway, and has long held an interest in the more esoteric and offbeat avenues of cinematic history. This interest led him to a Masters Degree in Film Studies and a career trying to get Nunsploitation and Nazisploitation on the academic agenda instead of Jean-Luc Godard. Read Reviews